Assault on Precinct 13

I started watching Assault on Precinct 13 (the 2005 remake) on Film4 the other night, but a little over halfway through it all went to cock and the cancelled the showing. It took them 15 minutes to announce this – I reckon they’d sent one of the temps off to Blockbuster to try and rent a copy but it was too late.

So I downloaded it to catch the tail end. I don’t feel bad about it – I was watching it on a Freeview channel anyway, and I’ve deleted it now I’ve finished. No different to taping it off the telly.

I saw the original John Carpenter version ages ago and it’s a cracker. The remake’s just as enjoyable and has most of the scenes from the original… but that does raise the issue of “what’s the point?” Unlike the two Italian Job films, for instance, which share pretty much nothing apart from a title and a brand of car, Assault is more along the lines of The Hills Have Eyes or Psycho (although nowhere as much as shot-by-shot as the latter).

The cast are great. The story’s good. The action’s taught. The bit at the end still makes you go “why didn’t they do that earlier?” like in the first film. The bit with the ice cream van is missing though. However, it doesn’t achieve anything the first one didn’t.

Certainly worth watching, I’d say the only thing it has going for it over the original is a lack of Carpenter-composed synthesiser music. Every bit as good as the 1976 version… just a bit pointless in its existence.